Spilled the Beans
by RobinxRaven writer
Summary: A small argument results in Raven revealing two secrets, and Robin revealing one.


"Come on! Just a little more…."

Raven blinked at the pages of her book, which had long since gone unread due to the constant mutterings and button mashing of the Boy Wonder to her left.

"No no no no no! No! Heal you stupid… There we go!"

Raven lazily looked up to the screen, trying to figure out what was going on in his game.

"If you hit me again I swear I'll-" The controller fell onto his lap as Robin threw his hands in the air when the _YOU DIED_ appeared on the TV. "Okay. Just pull a completely new animation out of thin air, why don't you?" He sighed, then picked up the controller.

He quieted down as the level started over. Raven looked down at her book again, focusing on the paragraph she'd been distracted from. But only a few minutes later, her attention was pulled away the book again.

"Nope, not even close!" Robin laughed in triumph. "Get goo- WHAT?!" He held a face to his hand as the level started over again. "I can't believe it. It was on the magic pixel. I let my guard down for one second and I instantly get killed."

Raven's brow twitched; not only were his outward reactions distracting, but the constant simmering anger rolling off him was annoying her worse than the occasional remark directed towards the game. She looked over at him. "Robin?"

"Huh?" He looked over at her. "What's up?"

"Can you be a little quieter? I'm trying to read." She held up her book.

Robin grinned and said, "Sorry. This game is hard."

"Mmhmm." She drawled out. "Why don't you play an easier game then? You can win and I get my peace and quiet." She crossed one leg over the other and leaned back against the couch.

He gasped sarcastically, feigning indignance. "I don't need to play an easier game to win! This-"

"Sure you don't."

"This just requires patience and timing." Robin finished. Then he held up a finger at her, and Raven glanced at him over the top of her book. "Besides, I was here first." He looked up at the TV and started playing again.

"You don't own the common room." Raven muttered.

"There are plenty of other rooms to read in, you know." He retorted.

"And there are plenty of other things to do instead of wasting your time getting angry at video games." She responded.

"Video games are not a waste of time. Not any more than spending time reading books."

"Sure."

"You never know, Raven. Maybe if you gave them a chance, you might find that you actually like playing video games." He said as he tried for the umpteenth time against whatever part of the game he was stuck on.

"Whatever you say, Richard." She sighed, looking down at her book as she the page over. Frowning, she realized that she'd have to start a few pages back, picking back up from where she'd first been distracted several minutes earlier. However, a new distraction cropped: The feeling of Robin's eyes on her as the room fell completely silent. She assumed he'd lost again, so her eyes flicked up to the screen, only to find the game had been paused. "What?" Raven asked as she looked at him, lowering the book down again.

"You just used my real name."

Raven blinked. Her stomach dropped as she realized that she really _had_ used his real name instead of his code name. "No I didn't." She lied and tried to cover her face by holding her book up.

A gloved finger pulled the book down, and her eyes made contact with his mask. "How did you find it out?" He asked.

"Look, I'm sorry, alright? I won't do it again, so just forget I said anything." She stood up and attempted to leave, but his hand grabbed her wrist, forcing her to turn around.

"I'm not mad, Raven." He slowly let go of her wrist, and she turned around fully to face him. His face fell slightly; he hadn't intended to upset her by being so defensive. "But if you found it out, that means there's a chance the villains could find it out too, so-"

"They won't." She cut him off, and sat down. "It's not- I mean, I didn't find it online or anything like that."

"What do you mean?" He asked.

Raven sighed, then let her shoulders drop. "Do you remember last month, when Slade's mask poisoned you and you saw hallucinations of him?" He nodded, his jaw tightening. "Then you remember right near the end of that ordeal, when I went into your mind?"

He nodded, then straightened in realization. "You read my mind?"

"No, not intentionally." She said quickly. "I didn't even know it would happen; I'd never done something like that to another person. I figured you didn't know I had done it, otherwise you would've said something sooner. I was going to keep what I'd seen a secret, but…"

"What all did you see?" Robin asked.

"A lot, not everything. Anytime in your time in your life when your emotions were strong, I saw a memory. I saw a circus tent, I saw the Batman, and the batcave. I could see Gotham through your eyes, too, and a lot of the villains you faced there." She confided. "Then the night you first met us, and a lot of the fights we'd been through together."

Robin turned to stare at the far wall, unsure how to respond. He couldn't tell her to forget what she'd seen, and it wasn't like he wanted to talk about his past, either. The whole reason he'd moved away from Gotham was so he could make a new life as far away from his previous mentor as possible.

He turned to Raven when she wrapped her hand around his arm. She seemed pensive, and he raised an eyebrow. She leaned in closer, and he lowered his head down.

"You know, my real name isn't actually Raven." She said, her voice barely above a whisper.

Robin's jaw dropped. "No. Way."

She nodded once. "It's actually Rachel. Rachel Roth."

He leaned back, his mind completely blown. "What?!" He asked, blinking behind his mask. "We've known each other for over three years!" He exclaimed.

Raven only shrugged. "Well, I figured since I knew something private about you, you deserved to at least know something personal about me."

"Wow! Rachel Roth. Ra-chel Roth. Rachel." He grinned and looked at the ceiling as he said her name over and over again.

"Alright, it's not that fascinating." She said.

"Yes it is, _Rachel_." He said her real name in a teasing tone. "It's a very pretty name. Raaaaachel Roth." He laughed aloud, positively delighted.

Raven turned and pulled her hood over head, hoping the shadow it provided would cover the blush that had formed on her cheeks. "Thank you."

"How come you go by Raven?" He asked.

She turned back around to face him. "It was a nickname I got back on Azarath. When they were teaching me to control my powers, my soul-self would always manifest in the form of a raven. So, Raven was what they called me."

"How come you didn't tell us sooner?"

"Well first off, it's _you_ , not _us_. Don't tell the others." She said.

"I promise." He held up his right hand.

Satisfied, she proceeded. "And second, there was never a reason to. Since me and Starfire don't have secret identities to protect, there was no point in telling you all my birth name. I'm used to Raven."

"Then do you mind…" Robin hesitated, then continued, "... If I call you Rachel every now and then? Just when it's you and me, of course." He added the last bit quickly.

Raven pursed her lips. "I suppose not." She said after a minute. "Just don't wear out your welcome."

"Sure." He smiled, and then turned back to the TV as he picked up his controller.

A comfortable silence fell between them, and Raven picked up her book and started reading again. As she turned the pages, trying to remember where she'd been ages ago, she realized that the silence hadn't been broken by the sounds of buttons being pressed or noises coming from the TV. She looked up, and saw that Robin was apparently lost in thought. "What is it?" She asked.

"Well, it's just that…" He sighed, "I mean, you shared something with me. I was trying to think of something I could share with you."

Raven raised an eyebrow. "You shared a bunch of memories. That was the whole reason I told you my real name in the first place."

"Well, I didn't "share" them. You saw them on accident. It's not the same." He clarified.

"It's fine. You don't have to do anything." She said.

He set the controller down on the coffee table in front of them, and then reached up to his mask.

"Robin, seriously-"

"It's fine. No one here has seen me without my mask off, so you'll be the first." He grinned at her. "Fair's fair." And with that, he pulled the mask off.

" _The mask really does make a difference."_ Raven thought, making sure her hood was pulled up so a shadow was over her face. She'd never considered him handsome before (not to say she'd found him unnattractive), but now that she could see his crystal blue eyes sparkling above his smile, there was no denying he looked very, _very_ handsome.

Seeing him without his mask on made him look like a whole different person. Granted, she'd probably recognize the spiky hairstyle, but if he brushed his hair down he could seriously pass for a regular person.

"Raven?"

"Huh?" She blinked, and the rest of the room came back into focus.

He grinned, much to her chagrin. She was totally busted. "Don't act so surprised. You didn't really think my mask was a part of my face, did you?" He asked what was very clearly a _I caught you checking me out_ tone of voice.

Raven frowned, then picked up her book and pushed it towards his head, the open pages covering his (stupidly handsome) face. "Of course not. Everyone has... eyes." She mumbled.

He fell backwards onto the couch, laughing as his hands came up to the novel covering his face. "But are mine like anyone else's?" He asked.

"...No…" She admitted softly, leaning over and picking the book up from him.

Robin propped himself up on his elbows. "Still think it's no big deal for me to share?"

"Depends. Are you going to take your mask off more often?"

"Hmm…" He tapped his fingers against his chest. "Maybe. If it's just you and me."

Raven allowed a small smile to form on her face. "I'd like that."

Nodding, Robin pulled himself up. He grabbed the controller and turned the GameStation off, then switched back to satellite and started flipping through channels.

For her part, Raven was glad to finally pick up her book and actually make it through a few chapters, before the rest of the Titans returned home and she was forced to retreat to her room, while Robin quickly put his mask on when he heard the doors to the common room slide open.

~Spilled the Beans~

A/N

I've been having "soft" feels for this ship. Idk what that means, but it's the only way I can describe it. Like, not hard "I love you's" or a scenes that end in a passionate kiss, but just scenes where they're happy and talking and together.


End file.
